Logical and Consistent? An Analysis of Supreme Court Opinions Regarding the Death Penalty Matthew B. Robinson and Kathleen M. Simon* Volume 3 - No. 1 Spring 2006 * Matthew B. Robinson and Kathleen M. Simon are Associate Professors in the Department of Political Science and Criminal Justice at Appalachian State University.
Abstract This paper examines opinions by Supreme Court justices of the most significant death penalty cases of the 1970s and 1980s [i.e., Furman v. Georgia (1972), Gregg v. Georgia (1976), Woodson v. North Carolina (1976), and McCleskey v. Kemp (1987)]. We seek to determine: 1) what main justifications were used by justices to support their own opinions; 2) how inconsistent over these cases were justices in issuing their opinions; and 3) what factors led to changes in opinions across time. We examine three types of inconsistency: First, issuing an opinion that is contradictory to opinions issued in earlier cases (e.g., a justice rules in favor of capital punishment in one case and then against it in another, or vice versa); Second, issuing an opinion that appears to be contradictory to statements made in written opinions in earlier cases (e.g., a justice votes in a way opposite to the principles he or she has put forth in previous cases); and Third, ruling in a way that appears to violate a precedent or rule of law. We seek to explain such inconsistencies to illuminate why capital punishment is still legal despite numerous problems with its application. It is these cases that best illustrate why capital punishment persists. 2
About the Authors Matthew Robinson is Associate Professor of Criminal Justice at Appalachian State University and is past President of the Southern Criminal Justice Association. His teaching and research are in the areas of criminological theory, crime prevention, criminal justice policy, the war on drugs, and the death penalty. E-mail: robinsnmb@appstate.edu Kathleen Simon is Associate Professor of Criminal Justice at Appalachian State University and is past President of the North Criminal Justice Association. Her teaching and research are in the areas of criminal law, criminal procedure, judicial process, and white-collar crime. E-mail: simonkm@appstate.edu 3
Logical and Consistent? An Analysis of Supreme Court Opinions Regarding the Death Penalty Introduction According to Merriam Webster s Unabridged Dictionary (2002), the term inconsistent means lacking consistency; as not compatible with another fact or claim; containing incompatible elements; incoherent or illogical in thought or actions. The term inconsistent can be applied to Supreme Court activity. For example, insider accounts of Court operations (e.g., see Lazarus, 1999; Woodward and Armstrong, 1979) and analyses of private papers of Supreme Court justices (e.g., see Epstein and Knight, 1998) show wide inconsistencies across all stages of Court activity. Inconsistencies appear in Court decisions to grant or deny certiorari (cert.) in conference discussions among justices, in circulated drafts of preliminary opinions, in the final written opinions of the justices, and in opinions across time. Inconsistency also shows up when considering stays of executions. One example is that of Alpha Otis O Daniel Stephens, a poor, African American death row inmate in Georgia who was granted a stay by five justices on the Court (including Brennan, White, Marshall, Blackmun, and Stevens) in 1986. When Stephens filed his petition, the same five justices originally agreed to accept the case. Yet, at conference, only three justices voted to hear the case because White and Blackmun changed their minds without explanation. As a result of a dissent prepared by Justice Brennan, the New York Times ran an editorial that was highly critical of the Court and its inconsistency. The Court even split 4-4 on whether to grant stays of executions when Justice Powell was away because he was ill with cancer. The New York Times again wrote a scathing editorial of the Court as it allowed an inmate to be executed on a tie vote (Lazarus, 1999: 155-157). One might wonder how Supreme Court activity could be lacking [in] consistency; as not 4
compatible with another fact or claim; containing incompatible elements; incoherent or illogical in thought or actions especially when lives hang in the balance as they do with the death penalty cases. Apparently, even among Supreme Court justices, capital punishment is a contentious issue. It seems to breed inconsistency. Lazarus (1999: 13) explains that the issue of the death penalty provides an especially revealing view into the Court s work as a whole. Death penalty cases, both now and in the past, cut to the root of the Court s ideological divisions. In the terrible context of a choice between life and death, these cases raise many of the issues that have divided the legal world since the Civil War, including issues about the Court s own role and authority. This paper is aimed at providing some understanding of Supreme Court activity on four major cases pertaining to the death penalty in the United States. Specifically, we examine: 1) what main justifications were used by justices to support their own opinions; 2) how inconsistent over these cases were individual justices in issuing his/her opinions; and 3) what factors led to changes in opinions across time. Our analysis is limited to the cases that had the largest influence on the administration of capital punishment in the United States, including Furman v. Georgia (1972), Gregg v. Georgia (1976), Woodson v. North Carolina (1976), and McCleskey v. Kemp (1987). The paper begins with a brief justification for the selection of these particular cases. Justification for Selection of the Cases Of the many important cases decided by the U.S. Supreme Court with regard to capital punishment, four cases stand out as the most important because they determined how capital punishment is actually carried out in America (Furman v. Georgia, Gregg v. Georgia, Woodson v. North Carolina, and McCleskey v. Kemp). The Court invalidated all capital punishment statutes in effect in Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 228 (1972), but failed to abolish it once and for all. By outlining the problems with the way that American jurisdictions practiced the death penalty, the Court set the stage for changes to state laws that would be accepted by the Court in Gregg v. 5
Georgia, 428 U.S. 153 (1976), and others that would be rejected by the Court in Woodson v. North Carolina, 428 U.S. 280 (1976). These three cases are included primarily because as a group they determined first, whether capital punishment itself was constitutional, and second, under which conditions for first-degree murderers would or would not the death penalty be tolerated. Finally, the case of McCleskey v. Kemp, 481 U.S. 279 (1987) is included because many capital punishment experts view this case as the last real challenge to America s death penalty experience (Bohm, 2003). There are dozens of cases that could have been selected for analysis, including some before and after the time period under study here. Future analyses might well examine such cases along the lines of this analysis. We discuss some of these other cases in this article, but we do not examine any additional cases in great detail or attempt to draw conclusions about the universe of death penalty cases for one main reason: a careful analysis of the issues addressed in these cases allows one to understand why capital punishment is currently legal in the United States despite the numerous and glaring problems in its application. Our belief is that although these cases have been addressed at length elsewhere, never before has any other author addressed the very important issue of consistency / inconsistency across time in these important death penalty cases. An analysis of these inconsistencies, we contend, is critical to understanding why the death penalty is still legal in the United States. In fact, our experience teaching death penalty courses has shown us that it is these four cases that help our students best understand why the Supreme Court has not invalidated death penalty statutes in spite of the clear problems that plague the practice of capital punishment in America (Bohm, 2003). Between 1972 and 1987, a total of 12 justices were involved in deciding the constitutionality of capital punishment in the United States. These justices not only decided that the death penalty is not unconstitutional per se, thereby assuring its continued practice, but also determined under which 6
conditions it could or could not be used. The next section of the paper provides a brief summary of each case and then examines the main justifications for each justice in his/her opinion. The Cases and the Main Justifications of Justices in Each Case Table 1 lists the justices involved in the cases analyzed in this article. The main justifications for each opinion are listed in the table. Below, we summarize the opinions of each justice in these four cases. 7
Table 1: Main Justifications Offered for Decisions of Justices in Major Supreme Court Cases Regarding the Death Penalty Justice Case Furman Woodson Gregg McCleskey Douglas arbitrary sentences ----------- ----------- ----------- violation of equal protection Brennan arbitrary sentences see Gregg degrading to human beings arbitrary sentences (racial disparity) degrading to human beings not acceptable to public decision abandons stare decisis not acceptable to public Stewart arbitrary sentences not acceptable to public arbitrary sentences not possible ----------- excessive arbitrary sentences possible supported by public violates human dignity White arbitrary sentences acceptable to public arbitrary sentences not possible disparity is not discrimination supported by public intentional discrimination required is not a Court issue Marshall arbitrary sentences see Gregg excessive arbitrary sentences (racial disparity) excessive not acceptable to informed public decision abandons stare decisis not acceptable to informed public wrongful convictions Burger is not a Court issue acceptable to public arbitrary sentences not possible ----------- supported by public supported by public arbitrary sentences not relevant Blackmun is not a Court issue see Furman offers concurring opinion arbitrary sentences (racial disparity) decision abandons stare decisis Rehnquist decision violates separation of acceptable to public arbitrary sentences not possible disparity is not discrimination powers (checks & balances) acceptable to public intentional discrimination required of Constitution is not a Court issue Powell decision abandons stare decisis, not acceptable to public arbitrary sentences not possible disparity is not discrimination federalism, judicial restraint arbitrary sentences possible acceptable to public intentional discrimination required violates human dignity is not a Court issue Stevens ----------- not acceptable to public arbitrary sentences not possible arbitrary sentences (racial disparity) arbitrary sentences possible acceptable to public decision abandons stare decisis violates human dignity O Connor ----------- ----------- ----------- disparity is not discrimination intentional discrimination required is not a Court issue Scalia ----------- ----------- ----------- disparity is not discrimination intentional discrimination required is not a Court issue 8
Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 228 (1972) William Henry Furman was convicted of the murder of a Coast Guard petty officer % the father of 4 children and the stepfather of 6 others. Furman was a 25 year old African American with an IQ of only 65 who killed his victim in a failed burglary attempt (Bohm, 2003). This case was unusual because it did not fit the stereotypical killing in America. Because Furman was an African American and a stranger, and his victim was a Caucasian and a family man who served in the military, Furman s chance of not receiving the death penalty was slim, especially in a southern state with a history of racial unrest. Furman s attorneys argued to the Supreme Court that capital punishment in Georgia was unfair because capital trials essentially gave the jury unbridled discretion about whether to impose a death sentence on convicted defendants. Consolidated with Furman were two cases (Jackson v. Georgia, No. 69-5030 and Branch v. Texas, No. 69-5031) that dealt with death sentences imposed against African American men for rapes of Caucasian women, a crime which has been a primary source of discriminatory punishment in American history. The Furman case led to nine separate opinions by each of the justices of the Supreme Court, the longest ever opinion and the ruling was 5-4 that the death penalty statutes in question were $cruel and unusual# because they violated the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. Justices Douglas, Brennan, Stewart, White, and Marshall wrote concurring opinions and Justices Burger, Blackmun, Powell, and Rehnquist filed dissenting opinions. In essence, the Supreme Court found that capital punishment was being imposed arbitrarily, infrequently, and often selectively against minorities (Bohm, 1999: 23). So, it was not the method of death that was at issue, it was how the method was being applied arbitrarily and disproportionately to some groups of people. Bohm writes: A practical effect of Furman was the Supreme Court s voiding of 40 death 9
penalty statutes and the sentences of 629 death row inmates. The Supreme Court, however, did not conclude that the death penalty, per se, was unconstitutional. It was only unconstitutional to the degree that it was imposed arbitrarily and unfairly. Thus, 36 states proceeded to adopt new death penalty statutes designed to meet the Court s objections (p. 24). States grappled to quickly pass death penalty laws that would be considered constitutional by the Supreme Court. Nearly one-third of states enacted mandatory death sentences for some crimes (Acker and Lanier, 1998), taking the issue of discretion of judges and juries out of the picture. Most states passed $guided discretion# statutes that would give juries and sentencing judges some guidelines to follow when considering death sentences. The validity of mandatory sentencing and guided sentencing approaches would be decided by the Court only 4 years later with the cases of Woodson v. North Carolina (1976) and Gregg v. Georgia (1976), respectively. Justice Douglas defined punishment as cruel and unusual when it is discriminatory or selective in its application. He said that even though unfettered discretion was originally viewed as acceptable by the Supreme Court, even as recently as one year prior in McGautha v. California, 402 U.S. 183 (1971), that once a punishment is arbitrarily applied, it can be considered cruel and unusual. The death penalty as applied without juror guidance is arbitrary, which Douglas suggested was a violation of equal protection (see Table 1). Douglas wrote that providing no guidelines for a juror to decide who lives and who dies is unacceptable, especially given that it will assure biases against the lower class, those with inferior attorneys, and so forth. Douglas suggested that the discriminatory statutes are unconstitutional in their operation. They are pregnant with discrimination and discrimination is an ingredient not compatible with the idea of equal protection of the laws that is implicit in the ban on cruel and unusual punishments (pp. 257-258). Justice Brennan suggested that although what is cruel and unusual is not clearly defined, to 10
him it is something that does not comport with human dignity (see Table 1). Brennan developed four tests to assess whether a punishment comports with human dignity. First, any punishment that degrades human beings is offensive. Brennan wrote that the reason we outlawed brutal forms of punishment is that they violate human dignity because they treat humans as nonhumans. Second, he suggested that any arbitrary punishment, especially a severe one, is unusual: When a country of over 200 million people inflicts an unusually severe punishment no more than 50 times a year, the inference is strong that the punishment is not being regularly and fairly applied... the conclusion is virtually inescapable that it is being inflicted arbitrarily. Indeed, it smacks of little more than a lottery system (p. 292). Third, any punishment that is not acceptable to the public is cruel and unusual. Finally, a punishment is unnecessary if it is excessive. Brennan suggested that the death penalty is no more effective a deterrent than other punishments such as life imprisonment and thus it is unusual. Because the death penalty meets all these conditions, it is violation of human dignity according to Brennan. Justice Stewart also grappled with the issue of what is cruel and unusual punishment. He suggested that capital punishment is excessive because it goes beyond what states deem to be necessary and because it is arbitrarily applied (see Table 1). He wrote: These death sentences are cruel and unusual in the same way that being struck by lightning is cruel and unusual... [they are] so wantonly and so freakishly applied (p. 310). Justice White noted at the outset to his opinion that the death penalty is not unconstitutional per se and suggests that it is possible for a system of capital punishment to comport with the Eighth Amendment. He wrote that even though death is in theory a valid form of retribution and incapacitation, it does not serve either of these goals when it is used so infrequently. His main problem with the death penalty, it appears, is arbitrariness (see Table 1). White wrote that the death 11
penalty is exacted with great infrequency even for the most atrocious crimes and that there is no meaningful basis for distinguishing the few cases in which it is imposed from the many cases in which it is not (p. 313). Marshall, the final justice in the majority, examined the issue of what is cruel and unusual punishment and related it to the evolving standards of decency in a maturing society. He suggested that a punishment can be cruel and unusual if it meets any of four conditions (see Table 1). First, a punishment is cruel and unusual if it causes too much physical pain or is excessive. Second, it is cruel and unusual if it has not been practiced prior. Third, it is cruel and unusual if it serves no valid purpose or it is unnecessary. Finally, it is cruel and unusual if popular sentiment is against it or it is immoral. Marshall attempted to shoot down all justifications for capital punishment by suggesting that the death penalty as practiced does not actually serve retribution, deterrence, or incapacitation. He also added that it is more expensive than life imprisonment. The most significant part of the Marshall opinion is the statement of what has now been called the Marshall hypothesis. He stated $the question with which we must deal is not whether a substantial proportion of American citizens would today, if polled, opine that capital punishment is barbarously cruel, but whether they would find it so in the light of all information presently available# (p. 361). Marshall put forth what he views as the reality of capital punishment and suggests that people would not support it if they knew this reality. He concluded by writing: I believe the following facts would serve to convince even the most hesitant of citizens to condemn death as a sanction: capital punishment is imposed discriminatorily against certain identifiable classes of people; there is evidence that innocent people have been executed before their innocence can be proved; and the death penalty wreaks havoc with out entire criminal justice system (pp. 263-264). 12
In his dissent, Chief Justice Burger suggested that what is cruel and unusual is not clearly defined, but noted that what is unacceptable is not up to the Court but is up to legislatures of the states and to the U.S. Congress (see Table 1). He went on to show that the death penalty is widely supported in public opinion polls and that it is practiced in 42 jurisdictions, meaning it is not against our evolving standards of decency. Burger conceded that the death penalty is rarely applied but wrote that it would be unrealistic to assume that juries have been perfectly consistent in choosing the cases where the death penalty is to be imposed, for no human institution performs with perfect consistency (p. 389). He appears to be saying that even though the death penalty is arbitrarily applied, this is acceptable since consistency is not humanly possible. Burger concluded the claim of arbitrariness is not only lacking in empirical support, but also it manifestly fails to establish that the death penalty is a cruel and unusual punishment (pp. 398-399). Furthermore, Burger stated that it is not up to courts to decide the efficacy of punishment and that the U.S. Constitution does not demand that we follow informed principles of penology. He suggested that deterrence is simply not relevant to the Constitution. He stated that the facts of majority are not supported and claims that the Court has exceeded its power in its ruling. Finally, it should be pointed out that Burger noted that decisions by a jury of our peers is crucial to our democracy and has been viewed by the Court as an advance from mandatory punishments, so to take away discretion of jurors in capital cases is a setback. Mandatory sentencing, according to Burger, gives too much power to the legislature to determine who lives and who dies. Justice Blackmun began his dissent by noting that he is opposed to death penalty personally but that what is right or wrong is not a Court issue (see Table 1). He wrote: I yield to no one in the depth of my distaste, antipathy, and, indeed, abhorrence, for the death penalty, with all its aspects of 13
physical distress and fear and of moral judgment exercised by finite minds. That distaste is buttressed by a belief that capital punishment serves no useful purpose that can be demonstrated (p. 405). Despite these feelings, Blackmun conclusively demonstrated that society has not evolved, especially in the short time since previous cases have been decided by the Court. Blackmun suggested that the argument that society has evolved is a good argument and it makes sense only in a legislative and executive way and not as a judicial expedient (p. 410). It is not a Court issue, then, but is an issue for the people to decide through its representatives. He concluded that the Court has simply exceeded its power. Justice Powell wrote that the decision departs from the principles of stare decisis, federalism, judicial restraint, and separation of powers (see Table 1). He noted that the Constitution specifically says capital punishment is acceptable, that the Supreme Court repeatedly has said capital punishment is acceptable, and that legislative activity in the states refutes the evolution argument. Powell also set the stage for future challenges based on race by writing: If a Negro defendant... could demonstrate that members of his race were being singled out for more severe punishment than others charged with the same offense, a constitutional violation might be established (p. 449). Finally, Powell predicted that only a constitutional amendment will change this ruling and says that the decision is undemocratic. Finally, Justice Rehnquist succinctly argued that the majority s lack of judicial restraint in striking down the state statutes violates the checks and balances of the U.S. Constitution (see Table 1). Rehnquist offered little in the way of explanation for his dissenting opinion. As explained earlier, after the Furman decision was handed down, states changed their laws in one of two ways. Some states passed mandatory death sentencing laws and some established 14
guided discretion for jurors using bifurcated trials and a system of aggravating and mitigating circumstances to help determine which convicted murderers should be sentenced to death and which should not. The validity of these laws was decided in Woodson v. North Carolina 428 U.S. 280 (1976) and Gregg v. Georgia 428 U.S. 153 (1976). Woodson v. North Carolina, 428 U.S. 280 (1976) Four men were convicted of first-degree murder of a cashier as the result of their participation in an armed robbery of a convenience food store. James Tyrone Woodson, one of the participants in the crime, remained in the car with a rifle as a lookout during the robbery. He did not enter the store nor did he fire any shots. Further, Woodson claimed that he was coerced into participating in the robbery by Luby Waxton, the man who actually fired the fatal shot. Woodson, who had been drinking heavily on the day of the robbery, said that Waxton struck him in the face and threatened to kill him in an effort to make him sober up and come along on the robbery. The two other robbery participants agreed to plead guilty to lesser charges and to testify for the prosecution and thus did not face the death penalty. During the trial, Waxton asked to be allowed to plead guilty to the same lesser offenses to which the others pleaded guilty, but he was not allowed to. Woodson maintained throughout the trial that he had been coerced by Waxton, that he was therefore innocent, and that he would not plead guilty. After his trial, Woodson was found guilty on all charges and sentenced to death under North Carolina s mandatory death penalty law. Woodson s attorneys argued to the Supreme Court that mandatory death sentences upon conviction for murder are unconstitutional. The ruling was 5-4 that the death penalty statutes in question were cruel and unusual because they violated the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. Justices Stewart, Powell, Stevens, Brennan, and Marshall were in the majority and Justices White, Burger, Rehnquist and Blackmun filed dissenting opinions. In essence, the 15
Supreme Court found that mandatory death sentences violated the evolving standards of respect for human life implicit in the Eight Amendment to the Constitution. Justices Stewart, Powell, and Stevens, in a plurality opinion by Stewart, held that two crucial indicators of evolving standards of decency respecting the imposition of punishment in our society - jury determinations and legislative enactments - conclusively point to the repudiation of automatic death sentences (p. 280). That is, society has evolved away from mandatory sentences. As shown in Table 1, the majority suggested that mandatory sentences do not take away arbitrariness because they do not give juries any guidance about which murderers should live and which should die (which offenders should be convicted of capital crimes and which should be convicted of lesser sentences). They also suggested that the respect for human dignity implicit in the Eighth Amendment requires consideration of aspects of the character of the individual offender and the circumstances of the particular offense as a constitutionally indispensable part of the process of imposing the ultimate punishment of death [and that the statute in question] impermissibly treats all persons convicted of a designated offense not as uniquely individual human beings, but as members of a faceless, undifferentiated mass to be subjected to the blind infliction of the death penalty (p. 281). Justices Stewart, Powell, and Stevens found that juries often find the death penalty inappropriate in a significant number of first-degree murder cases and refuse[] to return guilty verdicts for that crime (p. 291). They wrote: The history of mandatory death penalty statutes in the United States thus reveals that the practice of sentencing to death all persons convicted of a particular offense has been rejected as unduly harsh and unworkably rigid... At least since the Revolution, American jurors have, with some regularity, disregarded their oaths and refused to convict defendants where a death sentence was the automatic consequence of a guilty verdict (p. 293). Furthermore, using only the actual decisions of death-qualified jurors, where most convicted 16
murderers do not actually get sentenced to death, suggest that under contemporary standards of decency death is viewed as an inappropriate punishment for a substantial portion of convicted first-degree murderers (pp. 295-296). With regard to the issue of whether there is an evolution in societal standards against capital punishment, these justices concluded that mandatory sentencing laws $reflect attempts by the States to retain the death penalty in a form consistent with the Constitution, rather than a renewed societal acceptance of mandatory death sentencing# (p. 298). They went so far as to claim that these mandatory sentencing laws $have simply papered over the problem of unguided and unchecked jury discretion# (p. 302). Justice Marshall concurred in the judgment for the reasons stated in his dissent in Gregg, discussed later in the paper. Justice Brennan also concurred in the judgment for his reasons stated in his dissent in Gregg. Justices White, Burger, Rehnquist, and Blackmun dissented in this case for reasons stated in other cases (see Table 1). Rehnquist s dissent is the longest and is the only one that offers any details as to the rationale for the dissent. Rehnquist suggested that the plurality of Stewart, Powell, and Stevens is simply mistaken in their assertion that society has evolved away from mandatory sentences for first-degree murderers. Rehnquist attacks the plurality by writing that the states willingness to enact statutes providing that penalty is utterly inconsistent with the notion that they regarded mandatory capital sentencing as beyond evolving standards of decency. The plurality's glib rejection of these legislative decisions as having little weight on the scale which it finds in the Eighth Amendment seems to me more an instance of its desire to save the people from themselves than a conscientious effort to ascertain the content of any evolving standard of decency (p. 313). Rehnquist also reaffirmed his belief that appellate review of sentences will remove any arbitrariness in jury decisions, and again asserted that the plurality is ignoring previous decisions such as 17
McGautha which approved of unbridled jury discretion in 1971. Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153 (1976) Tony Gregg was convicted of armed robbery and murder after killing two men who had picked up Gregg and fellow hitchhiker Floyd Allen. Gregg and Allen had been picked up in Florida and rode north toward Atlanta when the car broke down. Simmons was in possession of enough cash to purchase a new car. After purchasing this new car, the group picked up another hitchhiker who was let out in Atlanta. Apparently, Gregg and Allen decided to rob and kill the men after the other hitchhiker got out of the car. This hitchhiker, Dennis Weaver, contacted the police after reading about the murders in the newspaper. The next day, Gregg and Allen were arrested in North Carolina driving the victim s car and were in possession of the murder weapon. Gregg s attorneys argued to the Supreme Court that the new guided discretion law was still unconstitutional and asked the Court to overturn the death sentence. The ruling was handed down on the same day as Woodson, and was 7-2 that the death penalty statute in question was not unconstitutional because it provided guidance to jurors in deciding the fate of convicted murderers. Justices Stewart, Powell, Stevens, Burger, Rehnquist, White, and Blackmun were in the majority and Justices Brennan and Marshall filed dissenting opinions. In essence, the Supreme Court found that the death penalty per se was not unconstitutional and the application of death penalty under guided discretion laws was constitutional. In upholding the revised statute, the Court gave approval to the use of bifurcated trials where guilt or innocence would be decided in the first phase and sentencing would be decided in the second, as well as automatic appellate review of convictions and sentences, and finally, proportionality reviews to compare sentences of particular cases against similar cases to assure just sentencing practices. Thus, suggestions made by the American Law Institute s Model Penal Code (in 1959), aimed at making the death penalty fairer, and were finally put into place. 18
The Court actually decided five cases this day, Gregg (concerning Georgia s guided discretion law and use of bifurcated trials), Woodson (discussed above), Roberts v. Louisiana, 428 U.S. 325 (1976) (concerning the state s mandatory death penalty law that also allowed for lesser sentences when defendants were convicted of lesser crimes), Jurek v. Texas, 428, U.S., 262 (1976) (concerning the state s mandatory death penalty law which allowed jury consideration of future dangerousness of offenders), and Proffitt v. Florida, 428 U.S. 242 (1976) (concerning the state s guided discretion law and use of bifurcated trials). Gregg is discussed here because the Court issued the most specific opinion for this case. Justices Stewart and White turned out to be the key votes in the Gregg decision, as each had voted to void capital punishment as practiced under Furman only four years earlier. Each of these justices changed his mind in this short period of time, concluding that Georgia s new sentencing laws would eliminate the arbitrary sentencing that gave them cause for concern in Furman. Justices Stewart, Powell, and Stevens found that juries under the new laws were given guidance (see Table 1). They wrote: The concerns... that the death penalty not be imposed arbitrarily or capriciously can be met by a carefully drafted statute the ensures that the sentencing authority is given adequate information and guidance, concerns best met by a system that provides for a bifurcated proceeding at which the sentencing authority is apprised of the information relevant to the imposition of sentence and provided with standards to guide its use of that information (p. 155). Further efforts to eliminate arbitrariness under the new laws include a state Supreme Court mandated review of the sentence, as noted by Justices White, Burger, and Rehnquist. The seven justice majority also pointed out that juries are given the option of a lesser sentence and that the death sentences under review were found not be influenced by prejudice, suggesting the absence of arbitrariness. 19
The majority found that capital punishment is valid given that it is a democratically elected punishment, that it has a long accepted use in the history of the United States, that there is no evidence of an evolution of standards away from the death penalty in society, and that newly passed statutes show it does not upset Americans. They explain that even though the evidence of deterrence is unclear, retribution is a valid measure of outrage over murder and thus capital punishment is justifiable. In summary, the majority of justices quote Justice White s dissent in Furman by stating that with the new guidance given to jurors: No longer should there be no meaningful basis for distinguishing the few cases in which [the death penalty] is imposed from the many cases in which it is not (p. 198). A similar sentence boldly claims: No longer can a jury wantonly and freakishly impose the death sentence; it is always circumscribed by the legislative guidelines (pp. 206-207). Justice White, joined by Justices Burger and Rehnquist, discussed that life imprisonment is a possible option for juries, that juries must be unanimous in recommending the death penalty, and that the state Supreme Court provides a careful review to assure that arbitrariness does not play a role in sentencing (see Table 1). Further, these justices claimed that any potential bias of prosecutors is not relevant for arbitrariness. They wrote that the argument that prosecutors behave in a standardless fashion in deciding which cases to try as capital felonies is unsupported by any facts... [the argument] that since prosecutors have the power not to charge capital felonies they will exercise that power in a standardless fashion... is untenable. Absent facts to the contrary, it cannot be assumed that prosecutors will be motivated in their charging decision by factors other than the strength of their case and the likelihood that a jury would impose the death penalty if it convicts (p. 225). Justice Blackmun simply concurred in the judgment. Justices Brennan and Marshall each dissented from the majority (see Table 1). Justice Brennan asserted again that standards of decency have changed. He wrote: 20
This Court inescapably has the duty, as the ultimate arbiter of the meaning of our Constitution, to say whether, when individuals condemned to death stand before our Bar, moral concepts require us to hold that the law has progressed to the point where we should declare that the punishment of death, like punishments on the rack, the screw, and the wheel, is no longer morally tolerable in our civilized society. My opinion in [Furman] concluded that our civilization and the law had progressed to this point and that therefore the punishment of death, for whatever crime and under all circumstances, is $cruel and unusual# in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments of the Constitution. I shall not again canvass the reasons that led to that conclusion. I emphasize only that foremost among the $moral concepts# recognized in our cases and inherent in the Clause is the primary moral principle that the State, even as it punishes, must treat its citizens in a manner consistent with their intrinsic worth as human beings - a punishment must not be so severe as to be degrading to human dignity. A judicial determination whether the punishment of death comports with human dignity is therefore not only permitted but compelled by the Clause (p. 229). In essence, Brennan concluded that it is a Court duty to regulate morality. 21
Justice Marshall claimed that new statutes are not informed by public opinion that is aware of the facts of capital punishment, and he even provided evidence from a study in support of his Marshall hypothesis from Furman. Marshall boldly claimed that the Court is wrong in concluding that death penalty is not excessive, that the Court accepts a flawed study by Professor Isaac Ehrlich which claims a deterrent effect of the death penalty. He went on to refute the notion that the death penalty stops families of murder victims from taking the law into their own hands: It simply defies belief to suggest that the death penalty is necessary to prevent the American people from taking the law into their own hands (p. 238). Marshall asserted that the death penalty is not necessary to stop killing and thus is excessive. After the Gregg decision, capital punishment states passed new laws similar to Georgia s and began sentencing more people to death. In Georgia, the last serious challenge to the death penalty would be decided eleven years later in McKlesky v. Kemp 481 U.S. 279 (1987). McCleskey v. Kemp, 481 U.S. 279 (1987) Warren McCleskey joined three accomplices to rob a furniture store. McCleskey, an African American man, secured the front of the store by rounding up customers and the manager, while his accomplices entered the store from the rear. A silent alarm was tripped and a white police officer entered the front of the store. The officer was hit with two shots, killing him. McCleskey, while under arrest for an unrelated offense, admitted to the robbery but denied the shooting. Two witnesses testified at trial that McCleskey admitted to the shooting and evidence suggested that at least one of the bullets came from the type of gun that McCleskey carried during the robbery. Thus, two aggravating factors were determined beyond a reasonable doubt, that McCleskey committed a murder during the commission of an armed robbery and that he killed a peace officer engaged in the performance of his duties. No mitigating factors were offered for evidence so the sentencing jury recommended death and McCleskey was sentenced to die by the judge. 22
McCleskey s attorneys argued to the Supreme Court that the administration of capital punishment in Georgia was racially biased against African Americans. The Court heard testimony from Professor David Baldus and others who showed in a statistical study that the death penalty was applied disproportionately to African Americans in Georgia. The study utilized a multiple regression analysis including 230 variables likely to affect the outcome of death penalty cases in order to test the hypothesis that race of defendant and race of victim played a role in death penalty sentences. This study found that 11% of people charged with killing whites received the death penalty, but only 1% of those charged with killing African Americans received the death penalty. Furthermore, the death penalty was assessed in 22% of the cases involving African American defendants and white victims, versus only 3% of cases involving white defendants and African American victims. Prosecutors sought the death penalty in 70% of cases involving African American defendants and white victims, versus only 9% of cases involving white defendants and African American defendants. After controlling for legally relevant variables, the Baldus study found that defendants charged with killing whites were 4.3 times more likely to receive a death sentence than defendants charged with killing blacks, or a disparity based on the race of the victim. The Court recognized the validity of these findings and even acknowledged a general pattern of discrimination in the application of death sentences in Georgia. Yet, the Court held that an individual defendant must demonstrate discrimination in his or her specific case in order for the case to be considered unconstitutional. That is, he or she must be able to demonstrate that the prosecutor acted in a discriminatory fashion in the individual case or that the legislature intended to make discriminatory law. The ruling was 5-4 that statistical evidence of racial discrimination is not enough to 23
demonstrate unconstitutional discrimination in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment s Equal Protection Clause or irrational, arbitrary, capricious sentencing under the Eighth Amendment. For capital punishment to be unconstitutional, a person must prove either that he or she was discriminated against as an individual and/or that the legislature intended for law to be discriminatory. Justices Powell, Rehnquist, White, O Connor, and Scalia were in the majority and Justices Brennan, Marshall, Blackmun, and Stevens filed dissenting opinions. The evidence of racial bias presented in the Baldus study, discussed earlier, was dismissed by the five justice majority (see Table 1): The statistics do not prove that race enters into any capital sentencing decisions or that race was a factor in petitioner s case. The likelihood of racial prejudice allegedly shown by the study does not constitute the constitutional measure of an unacceptable risk of racial prejudice (p. 281); At most, the Baldus study indicates a discrepancy that appears to correlate with race, but this discrepancy does not constitute a major systemic defect (p. 281). Justice Powell, joined by Rehnquist, White, O Connor, and Scalia, suggested that the burden rests on the defendant to show purposeful discrimination by the prosecution. The Court assumed the validity of Baldus study but dismissed the findings as inconsequential and suggested that disparities are an inevitable part of our criminal justice system (p. 312). It concluded that: In light of the safeguards designed to minimize racial bias in the process, the fundamental value of a jury trial in our criminal justice system, and the benefits that discretion provides to criminal defendants, we hold that the Baldus study does not demonstrate a constitutionally significant risk of racial bias affecting the Georgia capital sentencing process (p. 213). After discussing the numerous efforts to minimize bias in the system, and claiming that discrimination is an issue left for the legislature not the courts, the majority compared race to other possible disparities that could be demonstrated such as one based on different facial characteristics or attractiveness. 24
Justice Brennan, joined by Marshall, Blackmun, and Stevens, disagreed (see Table 1). They wrote: Nothing could convey more powerfully the intractable reality of the death penalty: that the effort to eliminate arbitrariness in the infliction of that ultimate sanction is so plainly doomed to failure that it - and the death penalty - must be abandoned altogether, quoting an earlier decision by Justice Marshall (p. 320). The dissent suggested that a demonstrated pattern of disparity based on race violates Furman, which said that even a substantial risk of arbitrary punishment is unconstitutional, and Gregg, which suggested a pattern of arbitrary sentencing, would be unconstitutional. The dissent discussed the racial make-up of victims and those subjected to capital punishment since the Gregg decision and concluded that there is clear evidence of discrimination by prosecutors in Georgia. They concluded that McCleskey s sentence was likely based on race and thus he cannot be put to death. The dissent also pointed out numerous times when the Court has previously ruled that evidence of race discrimination is not acceptable and that racial discrimination is a problem in other areas of the criminal justice system. They claimed that if juries consider race, their discretion should be taken away: $Reliance on race in imposing capital punishment, however, is antithetical to the very rationale for granting sentencing discretion# (p. 336). The dissent concluded by asserting that the Court, by finding that disparities are meaningless given all the safeguards, relies on safeguards that obviously do not work. Justice Blackmun, joined by Justices Marshall, Stevens, and Brennan also asserted that the Court issues an opinion that is inconsistent with previous rulings that have set aside convictions when racial discrimination is illustrated and that have required the prosecution to prove that it is not race but some other relevant factor that can explain away the discrimination. That disparities were most prevalent in the mid-range murder cases % where prosecutors and juries actually had discretion to decide which cases were or were not capital cases and which convicted 25
defendants would live or die % seemed to illustrate clearly that prosecutors and juries were abusing their discretion. This argument, however, did not convince the Court. Degree of Inconsistency Across Furman, Woodson, Gregg, and McCleskey From the analysis of the opinions in these four cases, it is clear that some justices were inconsistent in their opinions. For the purposes of this article, we seek three forms of inconsistency: 1) issuing an opinion that is contradictory to opinions issued in earlier cases (e.g., a justice rules in favor of capital punishment in one case and then against it in another, or vice versa); issuing an opinion that appears to be contradictory to statements made in written opinions in earlier cases (e.g., a justice votes in a way opposite to the principles he or she has put forth in previous cases); and 3) ruling in a way that appears to violate a precedent or rule of law. Table 2 illustrates the degree of inconsistency among justices across the cases of study. We have classified opinions into those that favor abolition of capital punishment as practiced or those that favor retention of the death penalty. These terms are misleading because the rulings in these cases only apply to the cases themselves and the laws to which they relate, not to the issue of capital punishment itself. Thus, we have labeled in Table 2 decisions as either $favoring abolition in the case# or $favoring retention in the case.# As you can see, some justices did change their minds about the administration of capital punishment over time, depending on the specific issue being decided (a change in position is indicated with the * symbol). The most important of these were justices White and Stewart, who opposed capital punishment in Furman, but who gained confidence in capital punishment after states passed laws to remove arbitrariness in death penalty sentencing (by passing mandatory sentencing laws, giving jurors guidance in death penalty sentencing, using bifurcated trials, and providing post-conviction review). White voted to reinstate capital punishment in Woodson and Gregg while Stewart only voted to reinstate capital punishment in Gregg. 26
Table 2: Consistency of Justices in Major Supreme Court Cases Regarding the Death Penalty Favoring Abolition in the Case Furman Woodson Gregg McCleskey Douglas Stevens (new) *Stevens Brennan Brennan Brennan Brennan Stewart Stewart Marshall Marshall Marshall Marshall White *Powell *Blackmun Favoring Retention in the Case Burger Burger Burger Blackmun Blackmun Blackmun Rehnquist Rehnquist Rehnquist Rehnquist Powell *White White White *Stewart O Connor (new) *Powell Powell *Stevens Scalia (new) * indicates a switch of position from the earlier decision Table 3 shows under which conditions each justice involved in these four cases determined that capital punishment is acceptable. The number in the last column of the table reflects the number of cases, out of the four cases analyzed here, that each justice ruled in favor of retaining capital punishment. Table 3: Specifying When Capital Punishment in Acceptable in Four Major Supreme Court Cases (Furman, Woodson, Gregg, McCleskey) Justice When is capital punishment acceptable? # Cases Ruled Rehnquist under all conditions 4/4 Burger under all conditions 3/3 *O Connor under all conditions 1/1 *Scalia under all conditions 1/1 Blackmun all except a pattern of racial disparity 3/4 Powell all except mandatory death sentences 3/4 White all except evidence of arbitrary sentences 3/4 27